by H P Tune
“Well, yeah. Giving up isn’t part of my plan. You never know what’s around the corner, what’s waiting for you in the middle of an ordinary day. Who might be waiting when you enter an Emirates Lounge.”
Juliet laughed, but she sunk a little lower in the water, clavicles covered. “You wanted to talk to me, Mia…” It was an abrupt change of topic, but some things had a now or never kind of feel to them.
“I did. I do, actually.” Mia drew in a breath, and her fingernails grazed Juliet’s shin, fingers visibly shuddering. “I kind of told you about what happened when I went to see my family, right?”
“Mmmm,” Juliet said, one eye half closing, thinking. “Kind of. You said that Stephen had told them about the whole girls…women thing and that they wouldn’t talk to you. Which reminds me, have you phoned him back?” She paused. “Oh, is that what you wanted to talk to me about?”
“No. I haven’t called him back yet. When I’m ready to not scream down the phone at him, I’ll do it, but I don’t want to give him that satisfaction right now. And besides, there’s someone who is so, so much more important around right now.”
Juliet felt her cheeks warm, and her eyes fell to the water for a moment before she could look back up again. “Did something else happen with your parents?”
“Not especially, but I want you to know my past, my situation. And when I went to see them, I still had some access to the family finances and business and stuff, you know, on top of my divorce settlement. But that all changed after they closed the door in my face, literally. I mean I was standing on their doorstep, and my parents and sister were all there, and they closed the door.”
“I know. It must have been…crap, just awful.”
“Yeah,” Mia said, shrugging, “but it is what it is. Anyway, after that, they cut me off. And I guess I just want you to know my situation, what I have and what I don’t have.”
“Mia, I really don’t...” She had some resources herself, but nothing compared to what Mia had. And she certainly didn’t think she was entitled to know the details of Mia’s financial situation.
“Just listen, please?” Mia gave her a pained stare. Juliet’s hand flew to her lips, and eventually she nodded, wide-eyed.
“So they signed over my trust fund, and it’s all in my name now. They sent me a copy of their will, which shows Daniela as the sole beneficiary.”
Juliet stifled a gasp, shaking her head at Mia’s wan smile.
“I know, it’s fucked, but what can I do? It’s not like the trust fund wasn’t sizeable. And with the payout I got in the divorce, there’s no issue. I’m all good…and I have this property and the LA one.”
Juliet creased her forehead. She wasn’t sure she was following. “You know, I don’t have a property portfolio, right?” she said. “And fortunately, my bank account has some money in it, and I have some bits and pieces in investments. But if you’re thinking we’re…Well, if you think we’re both bringing equal finances to whatever this is or isn’t, you’re really wrong.”
Mia was shaking her head all through Juliet’s announcement. “Sorry,” she said, “I’m not explaining well, and I’m really not meaning to offend you, though I seem to do that without even thinking about it. I just, Juliet…This is kind of me. It’s me, and there’s no one else. I have a past, a crazy, fucked-up past, but right now, it’s just me and enough cash that I can do whatever I like.”
“Soooo, that’s okay? I don’t know what you want me to say. It’s not like money matters to me, not really.”
“I know. I do. And it’s more about what I don’t have…I don’t have any important people in my life anymore. I did once. Well, I thought I did. I had a family and a husband and a…a baby on the way. I thought that I had it all worked out.”
“You had a plan, huh?” Juliet said, trying to summarise the meaning of what Mia had said. For once, the normally talkative Mia was clearly having difficulty articulating what she wanted to say.
“Yeah, exactly.” Mia nodded emphatically. “I had an entire life plan mapped out, but it was so stupidly flawed. And it fell apart a long time before I actually realised or accepted that it had. There are still lots of screwed-up bits and pieces, and I’m not all Zen with it. I mean, the world is pretty cruel if it takes away an innocent little baby because her mother was clueless.”
“Mia…”
But she shook her head. “You see, I haven’t been okay for a long time—a really, really long time. Now something has changed, and it’s you. It’s because of you, and I want you to know that. I don’t know what this thing between us means, because I’m only talking from my perspective. But I feel okay with you, Juliet. I feel like the rest of it all doesn’t matter when I’m with you.” She took a deep breath. “I am, so…” she paused again with a nervous laugh, and the words tumbled out. “I am so in love with you.”
Mia closed her eyes, and she put her glass down to wipe at her tears.
Breathing in and out, Juliet focused on keeping the air from whistling from her lungs. She had to avert her eyes momentarily from Mia’s; they were so full of honesty and openness. Mia was everything Juliet was trying to be but failing at. Mia was sitting opposite her, heart displayed on the outside and inviting Juliet in, wanting to have the conversations that Juliet so feared. What if she didn’t live up to Mia’s expectations? What if she wasn’t able to do the very thing she wanted?
But she had always wanted something more than she wanted someone; so what did she do now?
“Mia,” she whispered, drawing her wide eyes up to meet the tearful ones waiting patiently for her response.
“It’s okay,” Mia said. “I just needed, wanted maybe, to tell you how I feel. I hope that’s okay.”
“Of course, of course it is.” Juliet leant forward, drawing her knees up to her chest, and Mia’s fingers dropped away from her skin, treading through the water. Tapping her chin to the bony curve of her knees, Juliet reached out her hand and dragged it along the rim of the bathtub until her wet knuckles tapped at Mia’s bicep.
“Do you know how incredible you are?” Juliet said.
Mia rolled her eyes and smiled. Juliet knew there wasn’t a chance she was going to accept a compliment without sarcasm or direct protest.
“Hey, he was a fucked-up arse to treat you like he did,” she said before Mia could get a word in. “And your family, they have no idea what they’re missing out on—your attitude, your perspective, your intelligence, your openness. After how you’ve been treated and what you’ve had happen to you, you’re still here, laying it all out. I wish I was more like you, because you really are everything.”
Splashing droplets as she weaved across the surface in a distracted fashion, Mia remained silent for a long time. “Everything you want?” she finally asked, the words barely audible. Juliet could see the slow well of tears gathering in her eyes.
“More than everything I want.” Her own voice was a whisper. “But sweetie, I don’t deserve you.”
“What?”
Sighing, Juliet reached her hand to linger over the sleeve of Mia’s shirt until her damp fingers could move up to press to her neck. “I’ll hurt you.” She tried to put as much steel into her words as she could. “And I don’t want to hurt you. I want to love you, but I know I’ll end up hurting you.”
“How do you know?” Mia asked. A tear tracked out the corner of her eye and down her cheek
“Because it’s what I do,” she said. “There are even a few who would testify to that fact.” She shrugged and sighed heavily. “Maybe not deliberately, but does that matter?”
“I think it does.”
“Why, though? You still get screwed over.”
“It matters because there’s always a chance that this is different, we’re different, that I’m enough.”
Mia’s body shuddered under her palm’s touch. “You are,” Juliet said, and she made sure to articulate and emphasise each syllable this time: “It’s me that’s the problem. I bail. It’s what I do. The c
loser I get, the more I feel that I have to run. And I know I told you that I’m trying, and I am, I really am. But the closer we get, the more I feel like I can’t live without you. And then my mind runs like a million miles ahead, and I think to myself that I can’t stay, because I can’t possibly be everything you need or want me to be.”
“Juliet, I just need you to be you.”
“Mia, I barely know who that is. Like I said, I’m trying, I really am—you have to believe that. But I’m not there yet.” She scraped her thumb along Mia’s jaw line, and Mia leant into the touch. “I have this history, and I’m fucking ashamed of it. I’m like Forest Gump. I run like the wind as soon as I feel myself getting closer. It’s warped and crazy.”
“You haven’t run, though,” Mia said.
“Yet.” The one word made her chest tremble. She was airing her weaknesses like dirty laundry. “But I do. There isn’t anyone I haven’t run from in a long time. Surely you know this, Mia. I was on the other side of the world when my dad died, and Mom, well, I’ve left her in that place forever. And I phone, but I haven’t visited nearly enough. And my brother. Ben. I saw his grave for the first time when we buried Dad. How fucked is that? He was more than my brother, he was my best friend, and I never went back.”
She folded her legs underneath her, hunching her body so that she stayed hid beneath the water. “I’m just so scared I will hurt you, and you’re so resilient and strong. I don’t want to be the one to take that away from you.”
“I won’t let you. We can make this work. You promised to talk to me, to communicate. You said you would do that.”
Juliet nodded feeling the emotion bubbling in her chest. She had never wanted to protect anyone as much as she wanted to protect Mia. Even keeping her own heart safe seemed to pale in comparison. “And I am, I will. But Mia, you read my book, right? You asked me how much it was about me, yeah?”
“Mmm-hmm, yeah.”
“Well, it’s all crap. It was me, it was all me. Everything in that fucking book was me except the outcome. There’s no epiphany; it doesn’t exist. My journey of self-discovery and all that shit, it’s not true. I didn’t make it, I don’t know how.”
“So what? You never try? You’re giving up on everything?”
“You’re too important to me. I should practise on someone who is not…” Tears started escaping from her eyes. “I think I’m irreparably broken. I’m just…yeah. I’m broken, Mia. And I don’t want to break you.”
It was perhaps selfish of her, but she wished Mia wasn’t crying right now. It was taking everything Juliet had in her to say these things, and this didn’t help her get the words out. Nor did it help when Mia pried Juliet’s hand away from the back of her neck where she was rubbing at it over and over and clasped it between her own hands as if it were her prisoner.
“You’re not broken. You’re not. You’re hurt, and you’ve had all these reasons to not trust anyone but that isn’t the end of the story.”
Juliet stifled a cry, shoulders trembling; she gripped Mia’s hands back. “Remember, I don’t know how to end it.”
“We can try. Tell me that we can try. Because I love you. I’m not falling for you. I’m not falling in love with you. I love you, Juliet.”
They entwined their fingers into a death-like grip and held on. With tears trailing down their cheeks, they stared into each other’s eyes.
And held on to each other and cried.
CHAPTER 18
Days ticked by, and neither Juliet nor Mia had brought up their bathtub discussion. Mia found that they were being polite and supportive with each other, even more communicative than before in many ways, but still, there was something strained between them. It was as if they were both scared of the consequences if they did turn the conversation to their relationship, to their future.
But that didn’t mean that Mia didn’t spend time thinking about it. At random moments, she found herself mesmerized at how naturally beautiful Juliet was, even now, as she padded into the kitchen in thick socks and a loose sweater hanging low over her faded jeans. Her hair was tied back with a single hair tie looped twice, two pens pushed through the ponytail. Blonde strands had already long since fallen loose around her face. She smiled at Mia and it felt so good, familiar. She even trailed her fingers along the small of Mia’s back as she slipped past her and stood at the espresso machine, frowning at it and rubbing the corner of her eye.
“Coffee time?” Mia asked softly and Juliet nodded.
“I might just have instant.”
“Don’t be crazy,” Mia said. “I’ll make it for you.”
Fluidly working around the coffee machine, Mia watched Juliet out of her peripheral vision. She kind of loitered as if unsure of whether to sit or stand, to help or not. When the appliance stirred into life and noisily started heating water, Juliet surprised Mia by coming up behind her and pressing herself to Mia’s back, hands wrapping around her middle. Mia tensed at the sudden affection and then relaxed in her embrace. “What’s this for?” Mia asked quietly, tracing circles on Juliet’s forearm.
Juliet shrugged and tightened her grip. Mia felt Juliet’s nose press to the centre of her shoulder blades. When a few more moments passed without a response, Mia untangled the arms enclosing her and turned around, wrapping Juliet in a tight hug.
“You okay?” She swayed them slightly.
Juliet nodded, drawing her head back and bringing glazed eyes to meet Mia’s. She tilted her chin up and kissed Mia deeply, warm tongue slipping past her lips. When she drew away, Juliet offered a shaky smile before pressing her forehead into the nape of Mia’s neck. Mia made gentle movements over her back, trying to soothe her.
“It’s all right,” Mia whispered, lips to Juliet’s temple. “You don’t need to say anything.”
They must have stood that way for ten minutes, barely moving.
* * *
Lost in thought, Mia sat on the sofa across the room from the large dining room table. She had a small bowl of pistachios untouched on the table in front of her, and the coffee she had made earlier was half consumed but now was cold and bitter. She was mildly aware of movement around her as Janet went about her routine, wiping down furniture and preparing meals in the adjacent kitchen.
Mia still hadn’t phoned Stephen back, but knew at some point that she needed to. But her energy for the moment was focussed on trying to progress things with Juliet. Mia wasn’t sure how to convince her to take a chance on her, to convince her that even if Juliet did hurt her, it wouldn’t be anything she hadn’t survived before.
“Can I get you anything, Mia?” Janet’s fingertips squeezed at her shoulder. She was smiling kindly when Mia turned to glance up at her.
Mia shook her head. “No. Thank you.” She glanced at her watch. “I thought you were off today?”
“Yes, that’s right, but not until this afternoon. I’ll leave some time after lunch. Just getting some meals frozen for you and Juliet. Is there anything else you need done before I go?” She was leaving that afternoon for a week, returning to her apartment where some family were visiting.
“No, not at all. And honestly, we can cook. You don’t need to do all that.”
Janet shrugged. “I find it a bit difficult these days. I do half the work for the same pay. You’re too kind to me.”
“If you had been here before, my husband would have treated you like his personal slave, but that’s hardly my philosophy. And be grateful you were never on my mother’s staff.”
Janet gave a small smirk. “I have heard some things…”
“Mmmm, her reputation precedes her, huh?”
“Possibly,” Janet said diplomatically, although Mia was more than aware that her family had a terrible reputation and that many service staff had avoided them over the years. “I hope you don’t mind me asking,” Janet said after another moment, “but is everything all right? You’ve been staring at that coffee cup for over an hour.”
Mia smiled. “That obvious?”
&nb
sp; “Hmmm, a little.”
“It’s a little complicated.”
Nodding and smiling, Janet stepped back. “Things always are,” she said. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to intrude. Just thought you might need an ear.”
Mia drew in a deep breath. She certainly did need an ear. “Oh, it’s okay. Really. I’m just sitting here trying to figure out how to, well, what to do about…Juliet. I guess.”
“What to do?” Janet said.
“You’ve probably heard some things, right? Picked up on them. This place is hardly huge.”
“Ah, not really, not a lot. I thought things were going well between you. You both seem fairly content here. Juliet is looking better, I thought.”
Mia nodded. “Yeah, physically she’s much better now.” She offered a half smile. “And things are okay between us. It’s just…She keeps implying that she can’t stay here—with me—that she can’t or won’t stay with me, even though she wants to.”
Forehead creasing, Janet crossed her arms. “She’s scared?”
“I guess. I’m not sure. She says that she has to protect me from herself, that she’ll screw me over.” She realized she was blushing slightly at her choice in words; normally, she kept her language relatively respectful.
Janet waved at her with a dismissive gesture, as if she found Mia’s sheepishness unnecessary “Do you think it’s an excuse? I mean, what’s her track record? She doesn’t seem like the vindictive or dangerous type.”
“I don’t know. I don’t think so either. She’s gentle and caring, and I don’t think there’s anything mean about her. But she’s so insistent that she’ll hurt me. Apparently she has a bit of a history of running from relationships…people.”
“Oh,” Janet said slowly nodding. “Which is what people do when they’re scared, no? I’ve seen it before. When you get too close and it all becomes too serious and difficult, then it’s easier to leave. It doesn’t hurt so much if it all messes up—if it all screws up—if you’re not as close.”
“Yeah, exactly,” Mia murmured. “But what do I do? I don’t know how to convince her that some things are worth the risk.”
